


Leaves in the Wind

by itsmoonpeaches



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra, Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Aang (Avatar) - centric, Air Nomad Genocide (Avatar), Air Nomads (Avatar), Airbending & Airbenders, Avatar State, F/M, Fire Nation (Avatar), Gen, Minor Aang/Katara, POV Aang (Avatar), Post-100 Year War (Avatar TV), Post-Avatar: The Last Airbender, Western Air Temple
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:21:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25411534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/itsmoonpeaches/pseuds/itsmoonpeaches
Summary: “There is this one festival that the Fire Nation used to do,” he started. “It was a happy time when people would celebrate their ancestors. Gyatso and I ran into Kuzon while we went to buy a lantern,” Aang said with a smile.“Fire is life,” said Zuko.Aang furrowed his brows, something flashing in his memory that could not have been his own. It was like something distant, something familiar. He imagined for a second that he was an older man standing on the banks of a different winding tributary. Beside him was his beautiful wife, Ta Min, and his two children. He saw himself hold onto a lantern of his own, but this one was white. He used a finger to spark a flame and let it go onto the water.Aang blinked away Roku’s memory, eyes clear. “Fire leads the spirits home."-Or, after the war the Fire Nation offers reparations to the three nations. Aang remembers that there used to be a fourth one.
Relationships: Aang & Gyatso, Aang & Iroh (Avatar), Aang & Katara (Avatar), Aang & Kuzon (Avatar), Aang & Sokka (Avatar), Aang & Suki (Avatar), Aang & The Gaang (Avatar), Aang & Toph Beifong, Aang & Toph Beifong & Katara & Sokka & Suki & Zuko, Aang & Zuko (Avatar), Aang/Katara (Avatar)
Comments: 55
Kudos: 344





	Leaves in the Wind

**Author's Note:**

> So this one has an interesting and convoluted inspiration. I listened to a cover of Leaves from the Vine. I thought about Tenzin telling Korra that an airbender had to be "like a leaf in the wind." Basically this kind of came out of two very different sources, plus the thought that as of this year (yesterday), it's been 12 years since Sozin's Comet aired. I basically always have feelings about Aang, and am always open to giving him more love.
> 
> I think if you are willing to try listening to Service and Sacrifice from Book 3 of The Legend of Korra, the scene that it is played over as well as the overall feeling the music gives heavily inspired parts of this.

After the Hundred Year War, reparations were made and considered. Things were not easy, and they should not have been. There was a whole century of scars to sift through, and they were everywhere. Regardless of what was said, knowing what needed to be fixed was no straightforward task. What did come effortlessly was figuring out what should be honored.

To Aang, that could have meant numerous different things. All he was sure about was that in the past one-hundred years, there were thousands of souls that sought solace and never received it. As the Avatar, he could feel it rippling from the Spirit World into the Material World like a pebble splashing onto the surface of a vast ocean.

The Water Tribes demanded respect after being looked down upon for so long. He offered words of prudence; placating sentences strung together on threads of gradually raveling peace.

Upon the waters in the north and south, the tribes united in offerings for those lost. Aang was there with Katara and Sokka as a part of peaceful witness. He saw the tradition of releasing dozens of vacant boats to sea.

“In the Water Tribe,” explained Chief Hakoda to Aang, “our lives are tied to the waves. They ebb and flow like the tides. Though we have no one to bury, we release their souls onto the seas where life started, and life can continue on to the Great Beyond where the Moon and Ocean spirits can guide them.”

It was an intimate ceremony where people of both tribes utilized waterbenders like Katara to push the boats out. They disappeared behind mounds of ice and snow, around bends, ahead of the starry night.

The Earth Kingdom was more deliberate, as was their people. When he and Fire Lord Zuko attended these reparation conferences, there was a lot less discussion and more demands. Combining the older Fire Nation colonies into a new nation altogether was another challenge that came with swift trials. It took almost two years to conclude that some colonies were too integrated with each other to be considered either Fire Nation or Earth Kingdom. Though, the younger colonials were more than happy to return to the mainland Fire Nation.

The money asked for was not a pretty sight for the Fire Lord’s reserves, but what was managed was deemed acceptable especially when Zuko offered his military to assist with rebuilding as a compromise.

Yet, Aang watched as lost souls were remembered on carved stone. Earthbenders and craftsmen were in tune with rock and soil, building elaborate shrines and monuments to honor the end of the war.

King Bumi, his good friend, laughed and laughed in his boisterous way. He was always good natured, regardless of the occasion. He swept his arm over the great city of Omashu and told Aang, “When you’re my age—well I guess _you’re_ my age—you know only one thing: we all go back to the earth someday.” Then, he chewed a rather large piece of minty rock candy that he pulled from his sleeve, and grinned.

A few months later, Aang found himself in the Fire Nation capital. Zuko, of course, had saved his own nation for last. (“We started the war, Aang. We don’t come first here.”) He was worn out, and so was Appa. They had been flying from state to state for months with hardly a break. The war had ended two and a half years before. He had no idea if he would be able to continue like this. He was only glad that at least he could see his friends on occasion and was even more grateful that Katara had chosen to stay with him.

She took one look at the dour faces of the upper-class, the frowns on those of military families, and said to Zuko, “What your people need is to have a festival.”

She had said it as a joke, but a week later, they started to plan for one. They reasoned that she was right. The people needed something to make them joyful again.

Over one-hundred years ago, Aang had attended the Firelight Festival. He sat in the library in the palace, studying through scroll after scroll with Zuko and Katara, when he remembered. He had gone with Gyatso when he was only ten years old. He did not even have his arrows yet. 

His memory was fogged, as if shrouded in mist. But he could clearly see the tiny flickering flames that lined the streets, hung from homes, floated upon the waters of rivers. People used to dance to the rhythmic beat of drums, smiles on their faces, tapping their feet with each bouncy step. There were strings of bright crimson lanterns hung from roofs, and every face had been lit up with joy.

Gyatso had brought him so that he could experience Fire Nation culture in the heart of their most important holiday. “It’s best to understand other people, young one,” he had clarified with a calming voice, “so that you may be openminded to differences.”

It was there at his first and only Firelight Festival, that he had met Kuzon.

Aang inhaled, determined. He looked up to see Zuko scanning a scroll for ideas. “There is this one festival that the Fire Nation used to do,” he started. “It was a happy time when people would celebrate their ancestors.”

Katara leaned in closer to Aang, azure eyes brilliant with interest. She always seemed to enjoy his stories from the past. Zuko blinked, folding his hands on the table, and sitting attentively. His scar was shadowed in the afternoon light.

He named the festival and told them how he had seen one. “Gyatso and I ran into Kuzon while we went to buy a lantern,” he said with a smile. “He told us that his family had better ones we could use, and the shopkeeper was so mad! He took us to his house and brought us a round red one. We came with his parents and sister when they cleaned their family graves. Then at night, we lit all our lanterns and released them on the river in the village.”

“Fire is life,” said Zuko. He and Aang shared a look.

Aang furrowed his brows, something flashing in his memory that could not have been his own. It was like something distant, something familiar. He imagined for a second that he was an older man standing on the banks of a different winding tributary. Beside him was his beautiful wife, Ta Min, and his two children. He saw himself hold onto a lantern of his own, but this one was white. He used a finger to spark a flame and let it go onto the water.

Aang blinked away Roku’s memory, eyes clear. “Fire leads the spirits home,” he added, but it felt like he was talking in a different body.

Zuko nodded, golden eyes alight with determination. Katara requested scrolls detailing the Firelight Festival from the librarian. It turned out that the celebration had been outlawed by Sozin, and the festivities were largely forgotten. They had to ask help from the Fire Sages, but in the end it was worth it. The beliefs were still there, deep within the culture. The Fire Nation was always strong-willed and passionate, and they always believed in the will of fire.

Right away, the three of them got to work. They saw old design plans for makeshift stalls and ceremonial buildings, instructions on how to craft lanterns, meanings of symbols. Slowly, hope started to come alive.

-

Summer was the most sacred season in the Fire Nation. It was the time when the world was closest to the sun, and therefore the time when fire was the strongest. This belief had never changed even throughout the war.

This might have been the reason that the Firelight Festival always landed in the middle of summer.

It had taken months of preparation, but the time was upon them. Only weeks from the third anniversary of the end of the Hundred Year War, the first Firelight Festival in over a century would take place.

A few curious people from other nations were in attendance in the capital, and that included Aang’s friends. He was excited to see Sokka, Suki, and Toph after a few months of being apart. Even Iroh had taken time off from his tea shop in Ba Sing Se. He had insisted that he play some accompanying music during the three designated days of the Firelight Festival. Zuko was enthusiastic to spend time with his uncle.

Aang walked through the halls in the palace, the early morning sunrays permeating the windows and curtains. The walls were dappled with specks of twinkling light. The once ominous pillars stood tall and majestic, and the reds and golds were comforting.

He had finished meditating and was on his way to wake Katara so that they could go to breakfast together, when he heard the strumming of a string instrument.

“…Leaves from the vine, falling so slow,” sang a melodic voice.

He knew that song.

Aang stopped near a door that was ajar by only an inch. Inside, he saw Iroh practicing, plucking at his pipa. The sweet phrase continued, and the old man kept singing. The strings on the instrument reverberated with every note, and Aang felt the urge to stand behind the door and listen forever.

He saw them. His people. His friends, Gyatso, everyone.

He opened his mouth as soon as the lyrics started to change. He sang the rest of the words that he pulled from his childhood, going on until the end, letting himself into the room. It was only when he stood in front of Iroh, eyes wide and brimming with tears, that he realized that they sang of two different things. While Iroh had sung about soldier boys marching home, he had sung about leaves in the wind.

-

When Aang was little, Gyatso had taught him the most important things. These were the things that he was told would follow him forever. He had not yet known he was the Avatar, only that he was an Air Nomad. It was part of him to be free, part of him to not be whole unless it was riding gales on hilltops and climbing tornadoes in the skies.

To an Air Nomad, a soul was like a leaf in the wind. Freedom came only through where you were taken, to change direction as soon as you were met with resistance. Spirals with each passing day guided you. From the Tree of Life, a leaf would detach from its branches to be with air, to breathe with it, and to be open to it. 

Even in practice when bending the air, Aang was taught to be like a leaf in the wind.

The Avatar was the bridge between the spirits and humans. The Avatar believed only in balance, and where they ended up later was simply a part of the cycle. However, Aang was both the Avatar and an Air Nomad.

He believed in these teachings even as he released his own glowing red lantern upon the river that ran from the caldera that encapsulated the Fire Nation capital. Beside him, Katara gave him the supporting hand that she always had. Toph, Sokka, and Suki followed suit. Music floated in the background. People were laughing and children helped their parents to string lights above their homes.

A celebration of life, a celebration of ancestors. This was what the world was missing.

Yet, even amidst all the happiness and love, Aang felt a hole where contentment should have been.

“It’s so beautiful, isn’t it?” asked Katara. Her words were like a whisper in his ear, carrying her wonder to him on the barest of breaths. Their fingers curled around each other’s hold, and it was warm.

“It really is,” he replied as he turned to her.

In the dimming light of day, she was a beacon. Her brown locks of hair fluttered across her rosy cheeks; her rich almond skin glowed with the orange of the setting sun. Her gaze was stark against the beginnings of evening, and she looked at him like he was the whole world.

Guru Pathik’s wisdom lit up his thoughts. He spoke of life and energy and rebirth anew. When Aang saw Katara, he remembered them again. His people were gone, but he had been reassured that they lived on. He had lost and he had gained, and she was everything he thought he would never see again.

The hole in his chest was a little fuller when he leaned in to kiss her. She held him close to her, tilting her head up. He had not realized that he had grown taller than her.

“Oy! Oogies!” Sokka shouted, and the two of them split apart with a matching flush. Suki reprimanded Sokka, and Toph let out a boisterous laugh.

This, at least, was easy. Surrounded by his friends, Aang was lighter than air. The embarrassment and teasing were familiar. He and Katara could not look each other in the eye for the next few minutes, what with the ribbing and the funny comments, but he would not have it any other way.

With grins on their faces, they meandered through the streets. The tiny flames reflected off glass, glistening like droplets on plants after a storm. A woman lit incense near a framed picture, bowing her head with respect. Amongst the burning, earthy scents, he could see visions of his past rumbling upon the well-worn paths. He could almost see Kuzon playing pranks on his neighbors, throwing water balloons and getting into trouble, dragging Aang off to the top of some mountain to find a dragon’s nest, and Gyatso attempting to hold in his laughter behind a stern expression.

Zuko and Iroh even met up with them after the main ceremonies were conducted. They added a dynamic to the group that they had been missing. Together, everything seemed complete.

Aang _did_ feel complete. Except, as he wandered around, he could not help but notice that he was the only one who did not have ancestral graves to tend to.

-

After the third and final day of the Firelight Festival, Aang resigned himself to cleanup duty. He awoke with the rising sun, something that he had learned to do as he had advanced in firebending. He cracked open his bedroom door and made his way behind the palace grounds where he had his usual morning practice.

The space Zuko had introduced him to was an open training ground with all four elements accessible to him. It was land set aside by Fire Lord Zuko himself after the end of the war, and with the help of Toph and Katara, he was able to create an area that would be useful for benders and nonbenders alike from every nation while they visited for political reasons or other special occasions.

Though Aang was considered a master of all the elements by the world, he still worked to refine his skills. By the time Sozin’s Comet loomed, he had only fully mastered air and water. As he found himself with more time after Ozai was defeated, Toph instructed him until she had grudgingly admitted that there was not much else to teach him. It took another year to get to the point where both Zuko and Iroh deemed him a master of fire at fourteen years old.

Now at fifteen, Aang knew where his destiny led. It was important to keep his prowess up, he told himself. There was always too much to accomplish.

He let out his breath of fire. He grounded himself, and thrust forward, flames escaping in controlled action. He kicked upward, and a boulder took the place of a flat surface. He punched out, and the rock split in half. Flowing with his arms, he moved the water from the manmade pond until he had it in a tendril over his head.

He went through his forms with relative ease. Then, just as the sweat coated his bare chest, he twirled around into his natural element of air.

Aang closed his eyes with every step, feeling the breeze coast about him like a caress. He imagined the monks were telling him wisdom, the children were asking him to play, and all around him he felt the presence of the Southern Air Temple as it once had been. It was full of so much life.

After a few moments, he found himself sitting at the edge of the pond. He watched a sprig from a nearby acacia tree settle on the surface of the water, and it drifted away, spinning around on unseen currents.

Someone cleared their throat behind him. He was met with the unwavering gaze of Katara. Her eyes shone as she looked at him. She was dressed in a casual blue dress and her hair was tied halfway up. Her hands were behind her back, and her head tilted to the side as she observed him.

“Need a sparring partner?” she offered with a gentle quirk of her lips.

Aang nodded, standing to meet her. “Yeah, that sounds great,” he said.

He felt another gentle draft as he opened his arms and his chest, bare feet wading in the water. Goosebumps rose across his skin. With a wobbling splash, the water that he and Katara had been circling between them as a warm-up fell back into the pool. His breath caught.

“Aang?” Katara asked with worry. She stepped closer to him, placing her hands at her sides. 

He could feel her staring at him, and it was enough for him to give in. He met her in the middle.

“The Firelight Festival,” he began, “it’s made me think about some things.”

“Like what?”

“Who will remember my people?” he responded after a pause.

Aang saw her as she was, as he envisioned her on the precipice of the universe those years ago. He was told to let her go, and at the time he did not understand what that meant. Now, as their hands linked together, he did. Letting go of attachment meant knowing that the connections you made with those you loved were not a permanent fixture on their mortal plane of existence. It did not mean that love could not survive, that one was not allowed hurt, but that someday someone you loved would be gone.

He touched his forehead to hers. He was ready to share what had been on his mind. “The monks used to say that we are all like leaves in the wind…”

-

The next few days were strange, to say the least. He sensed a lot of whispering behind pillars. His friends seemed to be swerving away from him when he came into a room and he had been the only one not in attendance. Toph in particular, had some sick sort of satisfaction in blocking his way at every other instance he tried to walk down a hall.

He was about to reach his breaking point and confront them to ask just what it was they were trying to hide, if not for Katara urging him to pack a small bag for an evening.

“Let’s take a mini-vacation, just like old times,” suggested Katara.

“Where would we go?” he questioned, incredulous. “Where did all this come from?” He gestured to the blankets that she had already tied to Appa’s saddle. His bison gave him a smug groan.

“The Western Air Temple is nearby,” she answered, ignoring his second inquiry. “You never got to show me the all-day echo chamber, or the giant Pai Sho table. I think that could be fun!”

Aang sighed. There was no getting out of this one. Besides, he suspected that she had to have all of it planned if the prepacked camping supplies were any indicator. He let himself be led onto Appa’s back, and in minutes they took off into the morning skies.

By late afternoon, he spotted the canyon that hid the Western Air Temple. He steered them downward and toward it. Even from the air, it was impossible to see the concealed structures of the upside-down buildings.

They landed on a portion of the temple that he had never taken Katara before. It was closest to the places she had not seen yet. Even though the trip was spontaneous, he found himself excited to show her the wonders she had missed.

He took her hand and started to lead her away. “This way!” he beamed.

She tugged him in the opposite direction. “No,” she insisted, a twinkle in her eye. “This way.”

Blinking with confusion, he let her pull him through corridors that she should not have known. He realized that maybe while they had been there during the war, she had explored more than she had let on. He watched her back, clothes creasing and flowing through the natural winds. Her smile brought him back to reality when she turned her face to him.

Suddenly, she stopped in front of a grand effigy of Avatar Yangchen. The old Avatar was sitting in a lotus position, fists meeting at her torso, and eyes closed. Hundreds of colored leaves and petals littered the floor at the statue’s feet.

Bronze pots of incense littered the corners in strategic areas of the balcony, opening into the view of the cliffside that surrounded the Western Air Temple.

Standing near a dead water fountain were the rest of his friends, all looking at him with expectation.

“Remember what you told me?” asked Katara, bringing him to her side. “About the Ceremony of the Leaves?”

He gasped. He saw the foliage and red, pink, yellow, and orange chrysanthemum petals with a new light. How they had procured so many cuttings of a flower that was more typical in autumn, he had no idea. Perhaps the Fire Lord had something to do with that.

“Chrysanthemums symbolize life and death,” Gyatso had informed him so long ago. “We use them for medicine, and that is why our ancestors often referred to them as the flower of life.”

Katara pushed him forward. He stumbled on his feet, too stunned to say a word. He looked around. There were things a little out of place. There should have been a gong at the forefront as well, but this was enough. It was more than enough.

“There are four nations, Aang,” spoke Zuko. “and the Fire Nation has not forgotten our debt to the Air Nomads.”

Aang should have known. He should have remembered. This was part of the balance he strived for. He stepped forward to the boundary of the wall, just beside an incense burner. The leaves and petals below his feet shuffled under his shoes.

He took a deep breath. In place of the flutes that were supposed to play behind him, Iroh strummed his pipa.

“…like fragile tiny shells,” sang Iroh. He was smiling the whole time. He was pleased, colored with promise. He had explained that his late son would have been proud.

Aang let the Avatar State overtake him just for a second and shuddered as the surge of power from all his past lives resonated through his body. With a confident sweep of his arms, and a shift in his stance, he let loose an incredible gust of air that lifted the carpet of leaves and chrysanthemum petals into a swirling mass and blew them forward. A swell burst forth, rising and falling, and they flew past all of them into the skies above and the cliffs below. He let the air guide them.

Finally, after too long, his people were free. 

In the background, Iroh sang and replaced the lyrics of the chorus of his song to the ones Aang had known before the war, the words that he had shared:

_“Little ones like you_

_Leaves in the wind_

_Great ones like you_

_Leaves in the wind.”_

Aang knew that people changed, and that the world would never be the same. It had been generations since all the nations knew what peace was. Tales of his people sounded like mere myths. Songs that he had known morphed into ones that hoped for the end of war, that wished for soldiers to come home from a never-ending battle. He did not begrudge anyone for what was lost and what was altered. There was too much to be done, too much to understand.

In the end, a soldier returning home was the same as a leaf in the wind.

**Author's Note:**

> If you've made it this far, thank you! Please comment if you like!


End file.
